George Will renounces GOP, declares ‘This is not my party’ – Washington Times

The Republican Party’s acceptance of Donald Trump as its presumptive presidential nominee has prompted acclaimed conservative columnist George Will to change his political affiliation, the writer revealed Friday.

A Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist for the Washington Post, Mr. Will changed his voter registration in the state of Maryland earlier this month from Republican to “unaffiliated,” he told PJ Media during an interview Friday.

“This is not my party,” Mr. Will said at an event in Washington, D.C. earlier in the day, the website reported.

Mr. Will has been a vocal critic of the GOP’s presumptive nominee since well before the New York businessman announced his candidacy 2015, and said the decision to part ways with the party was the result of the recent endorsement made by House Speaker Paul Ryan, Wisconsin Republican, according to PJ Media.

Nearly four months before voters elect the next U.S. president, Mr. Will said it’s a “little too late” for Republicans to rally behind another candidate. “Make sure he loses. Grit their teeth for four years and win the White House,” he told the website Friday.

In a column published in the Post one day earlier, Mr. Will urged Republicans to reconsider supporting their party’s presumptive pick for president.

“Trump’s campaign has less cash ($1.3 million) than some congressional candidates have, so Republican donors have never been more important than they are at this moment. They can save their party by not aiding its nominee,” he wrote.

Speaking to PJ Media, Mr. Will added that a “President Trump” with “no opposition” from a GOP-controlled Congress would be worse for the country than putting Hillary Clinton in the White House with a Republican-led House and Senate.